Boom: An Autobiography For A Generation

By Mic Murphy

About the Book
Before plunging recklessly into the psyche-squashing humiliations and epic tales of buffoonery, Murphy invites us to ride shotgun on his achingly funny and tearfully poignant roadtrip of self-discovery and reinvention. Buckle up, it's a MasterClass in Humanities. Whether we're having a drink with Warhol or getting rescued onstage by Robin Williams, Baby Boomers get the chance to vicariously relive their lives through this deeply intimate American saga. And before we run out of gas, our well-traveled guide lets us in on a secret: It's possible to find our way back home once we laugh, cry, forgive, and love again.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Dorrance Publishing Company
• Release date: Dec 19, 2023
• ISBN: 9798888128701

Book preview

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To all those who played a part.

But especially my leading man, Jack.

Preface

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At the time of this writing, I share my life with a loving woman and her jealous bulldog that stands between us whenever we kiss. We live in a very, very old home down the lane from an expansive body of water known as Cape Cod Bay. There, at the end of a sandy path, we fill our chest and prescribe the blue horizon to help ease our active minds. Our lives have reached the point where there is no need to hurry, never heading back till the sun, sky, water and wind have had their way with us. A pretty picture, indeed; one could argue perfect, if not for one missing piece of the puzzle. To the north, I have a son, Jack, who attends a good school and now spends most of his life with his mother. There are times it feels like I only see my beautiful boy from the stands of his football games — separated — by something — that gives me pause. My father died at fifty-eight when I was twenty-two. Our time together longed for understanding. I left, he died. Honestly, I can’t quite figure out what it is I’m feeling. One thing is for damn certain: I have no plans of dying a stranger to my one and only child.

Prologue

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Homo sapiens first made their presence known 300,000 years ago. They were a resourceful bunch — treading their way lightly around woolly mammoths and the random tar pit — finally banding together with their highly suspicious neighbors to discover methods necessary for their survival. Sure, they hit a few speed bumps, but overall, a damn impressive species. But that was before our time. Fast forward to 1945 through the present. A period of human evolution registering just seventy-eight years, or, 0.00026% of our existence, where we now find each other the stewards of modern civilization. After a great war that introduced a weapon so deadly it could destroy mankind, some struggled mightily over the threat. But the vast majority sought comfort in their beds, giving birth to a generation called Baby Boomers.

And now the species’ survival rests with us? Wow, that’s a lot to ask, right?

CHAPTER 1 The Very Beginning

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July 17th, 1956

Tumbling Dice

The Beginning. No, not my first pony, the very beginning.

I’ve never told anyone this before, but I remember being born. Not the popping out and screaming part but the compressed, gurgly gray moments right before. From the sound of my heartbeat to the muffled voices, I can still conjure the amniotic sensation of floating through a dense rain cloud.

I suppose I never mentioned it because I learned early on it’s best not to sound insane. And, if one does indeed have a screw loose, better to tighten it up now and then before such curious thoughts become words. Not that exhibiting some Conscious Crazy (CC) is bad for you. On the contrary. CC helps deflect the noise waging war on our natural impulses, a relentless and exhausting exercise that brought us sleeping in. I’ve maintained my concept of sanity, lo these many years, by flashing some well-timed CC now and then. Not too crazy, just enough iffyness to keep the tide of Unconscious Crazy (UC) off the beach towel. Now, these are the folks you have to keep an eye on. They’ll have you believing what they don’t understand doesn’t exist.

Hey CC, you remember your birth? Gurgly gray, was it? Really? Do you remember being dropped on your head, too? Have another beer, you crazy sonofabitch! Ha ha, I feel you UC, you ignorant, mouth breathing fuckwad!

Ouch. So, there you have it. That’s where we are now.

Not cool, right? Yeah, well, whatever. Sucks, right? It is what it is. Wow, that’s deep. Eat me. Now that’s deep! Eat me raw! Yeah, yeah, you know what I think? I think it’s time we got you the hell out of Dodge. Born to run, eh, Bruce? But first, we have to agree on one thing. Oh, do we now. I suppose this is where you enlighten me?

Our lives are the culmination of shared experiences. Family, education, music, sports, and politics were all major players in the Baby Boomer’s life. Not my life. Not your life. Our lives.

Are we good? I guess. That makes a lot more sense than the gurgly gray bullshit. Okay, I can live with that. Oh, bless your heart. So, what now Springsteen?

Let’s rock and roll.

So, drop the needle, bitch!

CHAPTER 2 The Innocent Years

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1958-1962

Midnight Rambler

A hiss. That’s all I could summon. The humidity, or was it a grease fire, inhaled everything else. All rational thought evaporated and reconstituted on the ceiling above me, pooling and dripping back down like depth charges. Just beyond the wall, the first-floor block came to a standstill. The guards had finally succumbed to Jack Parr’s orchestral sign off, So Until I See You, the final refrain surrendering to the born-again cicadas raising hell outside. This wasn’t how it was supposed to end. I had it all, charisma, looks, smarts. And now I was in a cage laying odds on trickles of condensation racing down the bars. What was left of my mind wandered… the Pirates, on a west coast swing, lost 5-4 to the Giants. Willie Mays went just one for three but managed two deciding RBIs. At .500, the Bucs were going nowhere fast. Then there was Elvis, playing the part of soldier boy, pitching patriotism from a hotel room in Friedberg Germany. Meanwhile in Caracas, Nixon’s Goodwill Tour turned good riddance. Fuck the gringo, screamed the Venezuelan mob trying to rock sense into Dick’s limo. Everything seemed pointless. And here I was feeling on the wrong end of an air conditioner, hope oozing out of me like maple syrup... It’s not so bad, mmmmm, that’s right, just... let... go... mmmm, you don’t need this shit... you’re damn right I don’t...

In one violent motion, I peeled off the sheet, sprang to my feet, and gripping the bars, began to climb. Perhaps it was three or four violent motions. And with each desperate attempt, my strength spent faster than a pocket full of quarters at the Wash ‘n Dry. You whiny little... You want out? Well? Do you? Easier said than done with a full diaper. But on the third try, I clamped onto the crib’s railing, pulled myself up, and rested on my belly. Peering across the abyss, a gold shaft of light through the window like a beacon. Over my twenty-four-month life sentence, I had never known what it was to be free, my brothers and sister running wild while I was held back by bars, constraints, and verbal warnings. And now, teetering in space, an epiphany: You are not alive. Free yourself!

There are only a few times in a child’s life when they decide something on their own. This was my third one. The first, parading around in my mother’s underwear and realizing that wasn’t my thing. The second, don’t run through rose bushes. I watched my neighbor do it and he resembled something awful emerging from a cheese grater. And now my third, was I in or out? I took a deep breath then tucked my drool lacquered chin into my unformed pectoral. And with the bulk of baby girth now favoring the outside of the crib, I let go of the rail, and all that came before it. I began a long, harrowing descent, oomph, onto my stuffed dinosaur and best friend. After our heads cleared, we laid on our backs, staring up at something dripping from the rail. Geez, is that your diaper, Dino inquired.

I rose and basked in the particle rich beam, my entire body trembling with anticipation. Was I free or was it all a dream? I pinched my penis to make sure I was awake, and I was. Quickly, I began feeling my way past bedroom doors and across the living room’s cut pile carpeting, scurrying up to the imposing front door and its faux brass lyre shaped handle. Well? What are you waiting for? I grabbed hold of it with both hands and hoisted myself aloft, forcing the door open by pushing off the frame with my left foot. As I rode the door backward, I grew lightheaded knowing I was now on the threshold of freedom. There, through the glass storm door, I spotted my pitted yellow Tonka truck waiting for me to come out and play.

A two-year-old could pull a stunt like this in a white bedroom community in 1958. Living in Upper St. Clair, we never felt compelled to lock our doors. After all, crime only took place in the coloreds’ section of downtown Pittsburgh known as the Hill District. The eleven o’clock news lead ins at the time were invariably reports of dope dealing cop killers. I wouldn’t consider myself a racist baby, but damn, I can see now why so many were. Those KDKA news directors spoon fed us suburban white folk a late-night diet of Negro fearing stew. And we’d sleep on those terrible stories year in and year out, till racist babies became racist kids, and some years after that, racist adults. I hold out hope they’ll be more accepting before the grandkids arrive, but signs are to the contrary. I don’t recall Bill Burns ever reporting on White pediatricians who beat the shit out of their wives.

But none of that was on my mind now as I frolicked like a drunk panda in the middle of the street. The cicadas now cheering me on: Need more dirrrrrt, need more dirrrrt, come on Jimmy, need more dirrrrrrrrt! It was two a.m. as my TVA project broke ground, slumbering neighbors oblivious to the earth moving going on just outside their doors. I assumed that if I could see a car coming it could see me as well. Right on cue, the police car pulled over and parked. Already bathing the job site in its high beams, there was no need to add the cruiser’s door mounted searchlight. The officer’s haloed expression suggested he had never seen a child at play before, and that made me sad. After ten minutes of shaming Rose, holding the door open in her loosely knotted bathrobe, she scooped me away from the officer, managed a curt thank you and goodnight, officer, and returned me to my cell. I grew wary as she sized up the crib and swollen diaper as if clues to a double homicide. Rose exited, returning a minute later holding a single nylon stocking and washcloth. My God, is this apparition going to strangle me and wipe the prints? Instead, she wiped my heinie free of cinders while cooing something disingenuous. She applied an extra shake of J&J and pinned on a clean diaper as she had done countless times before. Then she took hold of the stocking. As I recoiled, she moved with the speed, skill, and determination of Dean Oliver, reigning world champion calf roper—tying one end of the stocking to a vertical bar and the other end just above my right ankle. Jimmy, you must never leave your crib till someone gets you. This is for your own good. You could have gotten hurt tonight. I was taken completely aback. Not by her concern but the fastidious manner in which she checked the knots. And then she vanished like the Ghost in Hamlet, Act 1: Scene 1. The block once again fell silent. After the better part of an hour picking at the stocking, I began to fall asleep, Rose’s warning echoing from the shadows: Jimmy, you must never leave your crib... Jimmy, you must never leave... Jimmy, you must never...

The next morning, still feeling violated from the non-consensual bondage treatment, I was led into the hardware store up at Mitchell’s Corners, a heavily trafficked retail portal located minutes from our house. No one knew who the Mitchells were and how they got their own corner. The location consisted of a two-story, trapezium shaped building of shoddy, permit free brickwork. It was home to a pharmacy, nail salon, one desk travel agency, and dingy, sparsely stocked, three-aisle grocery store. On the second floor, via a creaky wooden staircase, a parent or probation officer could often find their missing delinquent smoking in the decrepit bowling alley or two-table pool hall. It had to be a mob front. How else could this underage firetrap keep its doors open? Around the corner of the building, The Living Room, a low-key lounge frequented by middle class hoods who had a piece of the pool hall and bowling alley. Across the street, the dilapidated Green Lantern Tavern sagged like a drunk against Joe’s Barbershop, the aforementioned hardware store, something else (picture framing shop?) and an Esso gas station down at the corner of the intersection.

The entirety of this commercial hub was located on the Upper St. Clair side of the four-corner intersection of Route 19 and North Highland. Across the city-bound artery was a bordering neighborhood called Bethel Park. Mt. Lebanon began at the next light just down the hill. So, it was a busy little corner where a number of memorable events took place. The following scene is my earliest recollection.

INT. HARDWARE STORE — DAY

Enter ROSE, leading her adorable, impeccably well-behaved two-year-old son, JIMMY, by the hand. MARTY, the hardware store’s lascivious salesclerk, rounds the counter while tonguing a donut crumb from the end of his untrimmed mustache.

MARTY: Hello, Mrs. Murphy! (leaning in closely) What can I do for you today?

ROSE: Do you sell puppy harnesses?

The world stops spinning.

JIMMY (VO) Whuuuhhh? I’m getting a puppy. Oh my God, oh my God....

Overcome by the thought, Jimmy’s expression freezes in place as he relinquishes all bodily control, tripling the volume and weight of his diaper.

MARTY: We do! (stroking his mustache) What size are we talking?

Jimmy seizes Rose’s right leg, palsy with anticipation.

ROSE: Well… he’s about... (picks Jimmy up) ... this size.

Smash cut from Marty pinching his nose to Jimmy wriggling free and collapsing onto all fours, pawing a hole through the floor. Marty reappears with a garish accessory in hand flashing Rose an erect thumbs up.

The word fair should be banished from the world’s languages. All of them. Who decided outcomes are commensurate with one’s effort or behavior and therefore deemed fair? I chose freedom over imprisonment. And now I’m to be treated like a dog? How is that fair? Let’s call it what it is: a fairy tale. No, no, let’s go with a hairy tail!? Life isn’t fair, it’s cruel. How cruel? Spoiler alert: the following is really, really cruel.

I remember that summer afternoon like it was sixty-four years ago. Cloudy. I stood alone in the backyard, every crevice of my twenty-nine inches a repository of bacteria. Mrs. Beam, our next-door neighbor, was looking down at me through a window with a perturbed look on her face. Did I look that ridiculous? Yes. Yes, I did. The tight, red pleather and chrome studded puppy harness was not only of poor design and construction, it was painful: crimping my tee shirt and pinching my armpits and upper thighs. The entire apparatus consisted of a five-foot-long leash clipped onto the back of the harness and rising above to a closed pulley that rolled across a long metal guide wire. One end of which was bolted to the framed cloth roof over my sandbox. The forty-foot wire ran above our driveway past two garage doors, basement door, picture window, and was secured to a low-lying branch of the tallest maple tree in the neighborhood. The anonymous mastermind of this engineering feat figured I could safely ride my tricycle back and forth between the sandbox and the shade of the enormous tree and no further. An idea that probably looked swell on paper. As Charly Gaul, of Luxembourg, was winning the 45th Tour de France, I, too, peddled fiercely in the stifling July heat. Soon, the novelty wore off and I pulled over, resting my forearms on the handlebars, seeking relief in the form of a reluctant breeze. Our backyard had the best view in Upper St. Clair, atop a cascading bluff overlooking the tree canopied community of Mt. Lebanon—an older section of larger stone homes that later made the news for refusing to sell to Muhammad Ali.

My daydream was disrupted by a Good Humor ice cream truck creeping down the street—its eerie, jack-in-the-box recording seducing children from their homes. Gee whiz, what I would do for a fudgesicle right now. As I wiped the sweat off my forehead, I spotted the engorged, purplish-blue clouds billowing over the horizon. Within seconds, goosebumps sprouted as the temperature plunged and gusts provoked the maple leaves into a frenzy. The distant cannonade of thunder rolled across the southern hills when I frantically began searching the windows for Rose. That’s when the first lightning strike landed so close, the thunderclap knocked me off my bike. A biblical storm was about to release its heavenly wrath and there I was bobbing like a yo-yo, secured to a metal guide wire, secured to the tallest tree. Uhhhh, MOMMY?!!!

Rose was taking on laundry duties while Mrs. Dujak, her part-time helper, enjoyed a day off. She assumed that there was time to get a couple of loads in while I played. After all, Houdini couldn’t escape this cluster fuck of jerry rigging. Weather.com didn’t exist back then so I can’t blame her entirely, but I’m sure there was a Child Welfare Agency lawyer who could. Still scrambling for a foothold, I could see Rose entering the dining room picture window from right to left, laboring under an armful of hot sheets. She instinctively looked out to check on me, her eyes widening like the aperture on a Panaflex Platinum film camera lens. Up went the laundry, down came Rose, and I was inside before the first raindrops pelted the driveway.

That night, the mood around the dining room table was uncharacteristically subdued. At the head sat my father, Ed, 38, a handsome WWII vet who now ran a small but profitable food brokerage company. Three of his little darlings, Pat, 10, Kathy, 9, and Bobby, 6, sat on either side. Judging by all the darting eyes, it was apparent to everyone something was wrong. Rose served the well-done pot roast, boiled potatoes, carrots, and dark brown gravy in a stilted fashion, placing the platter and bowls onto the table in sharp, stabbing motions. At the other end of the table, I sat strapped into a wooden highchair to her immediate left, maniacally thumbing the carrots on my tray into a puree while trying to make eye contact with Rose. Her shuttered gaze never wavering from the center of her dinner plate until Kathy wondered aloud, So, how was everyone’s day? I detonated and Rose mushroomed into thin air.

Hours later, the fallout had settled peacefully over the house. My brothers and sister were in their rooms, Ed was in the wood paneled den ensconced in his deep red leather chesterfield, feet up on the matching ottoman reading the paper. From that corner he could admire his 7’ 1" swordfish that he reeled in during a recent trip to Mexico, mounted on the white brick wall. Rose remained conspicuously out of sight till my bedtime when she placed me in the crib. Continuing her vow of silence, she sprinkled talc under my arms where the harness lines had left their mark on my puffy, agitated flesh. Not until she zipped up my onesie and laid me down, did she reach for the stocking. It was then her bloodshot brown eyes finally met mine. No, Mommy. Please don’t. Please don’t tie me. The nylon fell to the floor as she leaned for support against the crib, daubing the gathering pools in her eyes with the sleeve of her light blue polyester robe. Today she was found guilty, and I had just sentenced her. She feigned a good night and turned off the light. As the door closed, I sat up and took stock of the brief but dramatic arc of my life. Then it was over the wall to see what Dino was up to.

Early, the following morning, the wall mounted rotary phone rang that jarring jangle that can only mean one thing: someone died.

INT. KITCHEN — DAWN

ROSE, leaning half asleep against the sink, answers the phone.

ROSE: (dully) Hello. (listening, then incredulous) What? He’s there?... Now? (beat, defeated) Thank you, Danny.

The solid plastic receiver lands pointedly into its cradle.

It turns out Bobby had nocturnal adventures of his own. The call came from our neighbor, Danny, a six foot six, seventy-five-year-old Castilian. Danny owned a restaurant downtown and was rumored to be a pimp. His pronounced mafia Don rasp made the gossip seem all the more plausible. The towering figure lived up the street in a stone split level with his wife, Adeline, an adult daughter, Carmen, a beauty in the Ava Gardner mold who worked at a modeling agency. She was the divorced mother of two boys, Danny and Billy, both playmates of Bobby. At some point during the wee hours, Bobby entered their residence and crawled into bed with Danny and Adeline. When Danny awoke, he found Bobby, like a post-coital six-year-old john, nestled blissfully between Adeline’s ample breasts. Qué carajo hace este chico acquí?!

Tying up children experiencing wanderlust, justified as it is, remains frowned upon by the courts. See Murphy vs. Murphy (JK!). But in 1958, you could do whatever you want. Just don’t get caught. And if you did, keep your yap shut and pay the piper. These were different times when the White Man reigned supreme. The entitlement and privilege that resulted from stopping fascism and communism, at least up to the 38th Parallel, had its stateside benefits. Let’s switch gears now and meet a few of The Greatest Generation.

George R. Murphy, originally from Schenectady, NY, was a plumber by trade. I was distressed to learn of this—not that my grandfather was a plumber, but from Schenectady. There was a time later on in my life I seriously considered dual citizenship to Ireland. I figured anyone as old as Grandpa had to be born in the old country (a DC requirement). The Emerald Isle had emerged as an artist-friendly tax haven, and after a beguiling trip to Galway, my expat fantasy took root. The root died after Rose informed me, he was born in Schenectady. Around the end of the nineteenth century, George moved to Dubuque, Iowa, the town named after French Canadian fur trader Julien Dubuque. The modest provincial city rose along a slope from the western shore of the Mississippi River to a series of rocky bluffs—an elevated anomaly leading immediately to the state’s cornfields. By World War I, he had fallen in love and married a formidable Fraulein named Theresa Hasenstab. The couple went on to have seven healthy children: my aunts, uncles, and father, John, Veronica, Margaret, Ed, Rita, George, and Anne. Once established in Dubuque, George became involved in city politics during the forties, rising through the ranks of councilmen to become a three-term mayor of the growing riverside town. Even in his earliest election posters, his gray, receding hair and round wire rimmed spectacles made him look seventy-five years old. Until he turned seventy-five. And then he looked a hundred-fifty. From what I recall from childhood experience, Grandpa was a kind, sober man who enjoyed a short stogie and a long story. He later paid a price for his cigar habit when a small portion of his lower left lip was excised, resulting in a slight, endearing dribble he’d deftly catch with a handkerchief. Theresa, a stern and solid presence, seemed to physically tower over her husband, but in height only. By all accounts, they complimented each other and were beloved parents. RIP George and Theresa Murphy.

Their son, my father, Edward Joseph Murphy, was born in Dubuque on April 19th, 1920 (one day and eighty-four years before his future grandson Jack). I learned about my father’s past the way most curious children learn about stuff—by playing in the attic. That’s where I discovered his bulky, leather and fleece lined Army Air Corps flight gear. The design and heavy materials were meant to keep a WWII flight crew warm at higher altitudes, but I’m sure another benefit was that it could digest a fair share of shrapnel. I also came upon an Ed Murphy Scrapbook compiled by his doting sisters, and a shoebox of authentic bombardier aerial photos. Also, a dime store jewelry box with three or four AAC medals, including a Purple Heart. Apparently, a piece of shrapnel found its way through the flight gear and into Ed’s ass. Looking over the faded press clippings, I learned he was a solid student and champion Junior tennis player while attending Columbia College, predecessor to Loras College. By all accounts, my father was always on the go. When he enlisted about halfway through the war, Ed wanted to be a pilot, but color blindness scuttled that mission and he settled for the role of B-25 gunner. The fifty-three foot long, two engine bomber was in heavy rotation throughout the South Pacific where he was stationed. The aerial photography revealed bombs obliterating train track lines and whatever else the Corps deemed strategic enemy targets. And if you were unlucky enough to survive getting shot down, there was a very real Bridge on the River Kwai POW camp waiting for you. Ed ended his service honorably with the rank of Staff Sergeant. Once back home, it’s hard to say what effect his bombing missions had on him. I would imagine eyeballing Japanese Zeros and dodging anti-aircraft fire—while saddled to a twenty-three-hundred-pound payload — might explain that second highball. At twenty-two, my biggest challenges were finding my apartment keys and unbuttoning a girl’s blouse with one hand.

Never once in the eighteen years we lived together do I remember hearing my father discuss his military service, tennis successes, or much else of his past. But he did save and store them away, so what did that tell us? I chose to believe he was a man of his time when modesty was still a virtue. His post-war life consisted of hard work and enjoying the fruits of his labor. The just rewards of a generation that overcame a depression to save the world from Heil Hitler! A remarkable story I wish my father had told me.

My mother, Rosemary Kathleen Gannon was born on September 8, 1927, in Milwaukee where she grew up with her brother, Tom, and sister Patricia. Their mother, Margaret, a hushed and selfless woman, who shared a striking similarity to the Mona Lisa, was married to my grandfather, Thomas Gannon, an extroverted conductor for the Milwaukee Railroad. And as I heard the story, his extended travels kept him away from home longer than Margaret could tolerate. And when he was around, he exacerbated the issue by drinking which led to their divorce. After the split, Margaret ran a boarding house where her three children lived and helped out. In later years, I was pleased to see the entire family gathered and cordial. RIP Thomas and Margaret Gannon.

It was clear from the black and white snapshots taken in the early forties; Rosemary was a pretty girl exuding a fresh, accessible quality to go along with her model-trim figure. In various shots with male callers, she appears both coy and affectionate, clearly relishing the attention. She loved to dance and possessed a soft, sweet, and emotional singing voice. Ed, sales repping for Campbell Soup